Underwear Goes Inside The Pants

Bread Lines vs. Foodstamps (Infographic)

During the Great Depression, "bread-lines" were an unfortunate but common sight as millions of Americans teetered ot the edge of starvation.

If today's SNAP benefit (foodstamps) was measured as a bread-line, there would be a line 7 miles long at every single Wal-Mart in America. Ironically enough, the heirs to the WalMart fortune hold more wealth than 42% of Americans combined. 

It is also important to understand that the enormous number of people on foodstamps has nothing to do with personal choices, bad habits, laziness, or other stereotypes, but rather is a product of poor economic policy. Just like the bread lines of the Great Depression were not filled with people who simply "chose" not to work, what is happening today is an emergency, but one that is less seen, slipped under the rug with rhetoric and plastic cards. The truth is, that even for many people who are lucky enough to find a job at all today, they still cannot afford to buy food for their families. By some accounts, as many as 80% of Wal-Mart employees themselves are on foodstamps.

There are solutions though. First, create a PRACTICAL MINIMUM WAGE. Second, end the vampiric economic policy of the Federal Reserve Bank. It's really that basic.

To see the high-resolution original presentation of the following graphics, click HERE and HERE

Also check out:

Wal-Mart Says Their Customers Are Running Out of Money

'My Time at Wal-Mart' Blogger is Wrong About Welfare

The U.S. is the Most Overworked Developed Nation in the World – When do we Draw the Line?

Poverty is Big Business

One in Three Americans Face Poverty, Latest Census Info Shows

Pictorial - Myth Vs. Reality of Life On Welfare





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'My Time at Wal-Mart' Blogger is Wrong About Welfare

Young college student Christine Rousselle generated some internet buzz, and even garnered some main-stream media attention, with her blog article about her experience working as a Wal-Mart cashier during Summer breaks. Specifically, she attacks people who are on welfare or public assistance, while demanding welfare reform, rather than addressing the true root causes of poverty. This is my point-by-point rebuttal to her propaganda piece, exposing her flawed arguments and bias, which are typical of those who would rather attack poor people than strive to change the conditions which put these folks on welfare in the first place.

Her article is hosted by The College Conservative and can be viewed at that link.

My Time at Walmart: Why We Need Serious Welfare Reform 

Dec 13 by Christine Rousselle

During the 2010 and 2011 summers, I was a cashier at Wal-Mart #1788 in Scarborough, Maine. I spent hours upon hours toiling away at a register, scanning, bagging, and dealing with questionable clientele. These were all expected parts of the job, and I was okay with it. What I didn’t expect to be part of my job at Wal-Mart was to witness massive amounts of welfare fraud and abuse.

I understand that sometimes, people are destitute. They need help, and they accept help from the state in order to feed their families. This is fine. It happens. I’m not against temporary aid helping those who truly need it. What I saw at Wal-Mart, however, was not temporary aid. I witnessed generations of families all relying on the state to buy food and other items. I literally witnessed small children asking their mothers if they could borrow their EBT cards.

The temporary nature of any aid is directly correlated to what created the need in the first place, and how long it will take for those conditions to be mitigated, if they ever are. This goes to the root causes of why we even have a need for a welfare program in the first place. The sad fact of the matter is that the relationship between government and business in this country have set economic conditions which induce a condition of permanent poverty in our country. Sure, some people may get on the welfare rolls, while others manage to make it off of welfare and get back on their feet. But overall, there remains a permanent underclass of citizens for which there is no economic opportunity whatsoever to be self-sufficient, and that underclass continues to grow each year as the job market continues to deteriorate. So long as those conditions persist, the temporary nature of welfare is idealist rather than realist. These are concepts that this young college student might have difficulty understanding though, so let's cut right to the chase here. Even in her own experience, she is not the expert she pretends to be.

Working for two summers at Wal-Mart is hardly comparable to working there for "generations." Unless she has worked there long enough to see one generation to the next come through her line using foodstamps, then she is in no position to render such an assessment authoritatively. Did she see Bob Jones come through her line every month for 18 years, with little Bob Jones Jr., who now also comes through her line every month with his own foodstamps? No, the only thing she could possibly have seen was parents buying food for their children, using an Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) card. Is it her position then that children should be barred from welfare benefits? Personally, I can't think of anyone more worthy of help than a hungry child.

I once had a man show me his welfare card for an ID to buy alcohol. The man was from Massachusetts. Governor Michael Dukakis’ signature was on his welfare card. Dukakis’ last gubernatorial term ended in January of 1991. I was born in June of 1991. The man had been on welfare my entire life. That’s not how welfare was intended, but sadly, it is what it has become.

Here was have already caught Miss Rousselle in a flat out lie. Massachusetts did not even begin using the EBT card until April 1, 1997. Before that time, benefits were paid by check, and foodstamps were actual paper certificates which were torn out of a booklet, which are facts that she is too young to remember. The idea that she even remembers the name of someone who was governor of some far-off state when she was born is very difficult to believe as well, and exposes how she was really reaching too far in order to try to make her point. I can't even remember who was governor of my home state when I was born, and seeing it written on some tattered 20 year old ID while I was at work wouldn't do much to sear it into my memory either.

It is also a fact that, contrary to popular belief, welfare does indeed have a time limit. Massachusetts happens to be one of 17 states with a shorter time limit than the maximum Federal benefit of 60 months. That is a maximum of five years, over the course of a person's entire lifetime, that they can get public assistance funding should they find themselves in need. The state where the imaginary ID was issued, offers even less time.

Seeing this blatant lie, it is clear that anything else this young woman has written might be entirely fabricated as well, but we will go ahead and continue here as an academic exercise. Other things she claims to have witnessed as a cashier, we will go ahead and itemize here.

a) People ignoring me on their iPhones while the state paid for their food. (For those of you keeping score at home, an iPhone is at least $200, and requires a data package of at least $25 a month. If a person can spend $25+ a month so they can watch YouTube 24/7, I don’t see why they can’t spend that money on food.)

Having a telephone and an internet connection is not simply a luxury, it is a necessity to function in our society. You can't even apply for a job in this day and age without an internet connection. And a telephone? Well that really should be obvious why someone needs a phone. To call to make a doctor's appointment, to talk to your social worker, to call 911 if your house is on fire, there is a long list of reasons why a person needs a telephone.

By using this blogger's logic, we might just as easily say that if a person can spend $100 a month for electricity, then they should use that money for food instead. Or toilet paper, if they can afford toilet paper, they can afford food, after all, poor people were born with hands. Toilet paper is a luxury. Go out and pick leaves if you don't want to wipe with your hand.

b) People using TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) money to buy such necessities such as earrings, kitkat bars, beer, WWE figurines, and, my personal favorite, a slip n’ slide. TANF money does not have restrictions like food stamps on what can be bought with it.

A pair of cheap Wal-Mart earrings is hardly luxurious spending. Making oneself presentable in public is indeed a necessity if one ever hopes to get back off of welfare. Walking into a job interview with no makeup on wearing a pair of old sweatpants is hardly the way to make a good first impression.

Judging by the rest of this list, and in particular her repeated disdain for children, it seems clear that Christine believes if you are poor, you should take no pleasure in life whatsoever. Kit Kat bars huh? Well maybe sugar for someone's coffee should also be made illegal for poor people. While we're at it, let's just force all poor people onto the old bread and water diet, then make them sit in an empty room staring at the walls all day. And her "personal favorite" the slip n' slide. What exactly is wrong with that? It's not as if someone went out and built a new swimming pool with a waterfall using tax dollars. I hardly find it offensive that my tax dollars went to buy a sheet of plastic so that some kids could have a little fun running around and keeping keeping cool playing with a garden hose in the hot summer months.

If someone walked in and bought a $3,000 flat screen the size of a panel van and paid for it using TANF dollars, that might be considered an extravagant purchase. A few token purchases of minor, simple pleasures is hardly abuse of welfare. Recreation and relaxation are necessary to the mental health and stability of human beings.

c) Extravagant purchases made with food stamps; including, but not limited to: steaks, lobsters, and giant birthday cakes.

Oh, the old steak and lobsters routine again. Every time there is a conversation about food stamps, there will be some right-winger who pipes up to tell us all about the time he saw someone use foodstamps to buy seatk and lobster. It's bullshit. People who are getting foodstamps are next to starvation, they aren't going to go blowing that money on a lobster. Not without a damn good reason anyway. Maybe this is their gift to them self, or their spouse, for their birthday, and they won't eat the rest of the week in order to afford this one treat for themselves. A steak is not necessarily even a luxury at all, but simply food, a necessity. Chuck steaks have long been a staple food for households on a lean budget. And birthday cakes. Again this young woman attacks children, and this time she wants to take away their birthday. Would you really walk in to a poor person's house, and take away their child's birthday cake? She probably would, along with their brand new favorite WWE action-figure. After all, we don't want the children of poor people to grow up spoiled with a sense of entitlement.

d) A man who ran a hotdog stand on the pier in Portland, Maine used to come through my line. He would always discuss his hotdog stand and encourage me to “come visit him for lunch some day.” What would he buy? Hotdogs, buns, mustard, ketchup, etc. How would he pay for it? Food stamps. Either that man really likes hotdogs, or the state is paying for his business. Not okay.

If this is actually true, then this would indeed constitute fraud. It would also be easily solved with a quick phone call to the local Social Services office. Obviously she knew who the man was, and where his hot dog cart was, yet she did nothing about it. It's also possible that the man did actually declare his income from the hot dog cart, but still didn't earn enough from the venture to put him over the threshold to be eligible for some foodstamps.

As far as the state paying for his business though, maybe we should take a closer look at what the state is paying for the Walton family for their little business, known as Wal-Mart. Low wages, lack of benefits, lack of overtime work and full-time positions makes the company one of the worst employers in the country, leaving taxpayers on the hook to make up for the shortfall. Thanks to the low wages paid to WalMart employees, US taxpayers must subsidize those workers to the tune of $2.66 BILLION annually, for things like Medicaid and Foodstamps. In Florida alone 12,300 WalMart employees are on Medicaid. The combined net worth of the six members of the Walton family is the same as the combined net worth of the poorest 40% of Americans, yet this young little Wal-Mart worker is attacking a small-business man trying to run a hot dog cart.


Let's Kick Wal-Mart Off Welfare

Why Wal-Mart Loves Welfare

Rep. Robert Hagan slams Wal-Mart over workers needing public assistance

Wal-Mart Welfare


So we wind up with only one of her four examples could even really be considered to be possible welfare fraud, while at the same time the very same company she works for actually forces employees to get on welfare in order to survive. That is not some temporary need. That is the new reality in America, that even people who get up and go to work every day, still need welfare in order to get by. That is not entitlement, that is Wal-Mart policy.

The thing that disturbed me more than simple cases of fraud/abuse was the entitled nature of many of my customers. One time, a package of bell peppers did not ring up as food in the computer. After the woman swiped her EBT card, it showed a balance that equaled the cost of the peppers. The woman asked what the charge was, and a quick glance at the register screen showed that the peppers did not ring up as food. (Food items had the letter ‘F’ next to their description.) The woman immediately began yelling at me, saying that, “It’s food! You eat it!” 

This wasn’t the only time things like this happened: if a person’s EBT balance was less than they thought it would be, or if their cards were declined, it was somehow my fault. I understand the situation is stressful, but a person should be knowledgeable about how much money is in their account prior to going grocery shopping. EBT totals are printed on receipts, and every cell phone has a calculator function. There’s no excuse, and there’s no reason to yell at the cashier for it.

It sounds to me that the real sense of entitlement here is coming from Miss Rouselle herself, as if someone using an EBT card owes her more respect than the average customer. Let's face it, working with the public is a strenuous, infuriating job. But just because someone is on welfare doesn't mean that they have to checkout their groceries in silence with their heads bowed, groveling to the emotional needs of the cashier. If the green peppers rang up wrong, it is your responsibility fix the problem. You may not have programmed the computer system that week, it may not be your fault, but you are the person standing there in front of the customer. That is what you are being paid for, to be a representative of the company, and to serve the customer.

As far as yelling at a cashier about the balance on their EBT card, I will agree that it's not very good manners, and it's certainly not the job of the cashier to monitor someone's account balance and spending habits. But just the same, even poor people are entitled to have a bad day once in a while, and might actually be expected to be having a bad day just about every single day. So you might try cutting them some slack. At the very least, don't pretend that this sort of incident is exclusive to EBT card users. Anyone who has ever worked in retail can tell you how frequently someone with a credit card or a bank card freaks out when their card gets declined, or won't swipe because the card was damaged. Stupid, pain in the ass customers come from all walks of life. Just because someone is getting government assistance in no way makes obligated to kiss your ass.

The worst thing I ever saw at Wal-Mart Scarborough was two women and their children. These women each had multiple carts full of items, and each began loading them at the same time (this should have been a tip-off to their intelligence levels). The first woman, henceforth known as Welfare Queen #1, paid for about $400 worth of food with food stamps. The majority of her food was void of any nutritional value. She then pulled out an entire month’s worth of WIC (Women, Infants, and Children program) checks. I do not mind people paying with WIC, but the woman had virtually none of the correct items. WIC gives each participating mother a book containing actual images of items for which a person can and cannot redeem the voucher. This woman literally failed at image comprehension.

After redeeming 10+ WIC checks, Welfare Queen #1 had me adjust the prices of several items she was buying (Wal-Mart’s policy is to adjust the price of the item without question if it’s within a dollar or two).

Now our young Conservative remarks about the "intelligence levels" of a few of her customers. If someone is indeed of low IQ, wouldn't that actually show more of a need for assistance than the average person even? Someone who cannot perform even basic and simple tasks would be considered handicapped. But maybe we should just let all the people with autism, or brain injuries just starve to death in the streets.

Paying for $400 worth of food with foodstamps is not abuse. The woman obviously had a family, and trying to feed an entire family on only $400 a month is not easy. People on welfare get a monthly allotment, and will often spend it all on one trip, rather then spending money going back and forth whenever they need something. Many people on foodstamps don't even have their own car, and can only get to the supermarket when they find a ride with someone else.

Admonishing the woman for her selections and the lack of nutritional value in the food she was purchasing reveals the ignorance of the young cashier. Because poor people cannot afford to make a trip to the supermarket a few times a week, they cannot buy much fresh food, leaving their cupboards filled with nutritionally deficient packaged and processed foods. Healthier food is also much more expensive. It is more important to not run out of food in the middle of the month than it is to eat fresh and healthy. Besides, as Christine tried to tell us earlier, things like beef should not be on a poor person's menu anyway, so bologna and Spam it is then.

She then closes one paragraph and opens a new one literally contradicting herself. In one breath she is telling us that the woman can't read pictures and didn't have the right items to go with the WIC checks, but then turns right around and tells us that she processed ten of those WIC checks. If she didn't have qualifying items, then what were those 10+ checks actually spent on? Did Christine commit fraud by falsifying the record of what had been purchased? Or is Miss Rouselle full of crap yet again, going out of her way to make a false portrayal of her "experience" as a Wal-Mart cashier?

Finally, as far as adjusting prices goes, when every dollar counts, it's hardly surprising that a person would be watching that tally closely to make sure there were no errors, and that the person would expect any errors to be corrected. Again, that's your job, so do your job, and don't complain about it when a customer expects you to do your job.

She then pulled out a vacuum cleaner, and informed me that the cost of the vacuum was $3.48 because, “that’s what the label says.” The vacuum cleaner was next to a stack of crates that were $3.48. Somehow, every other customer was able to discern that the vacuum cleaner was not $3.48, but Welfare Queen #1 and her friend Welfare Queen #2 were fooled. Welfare Queen #2 informed me that she used to work for Wal-Mart, and that the “laws of Wal-Mart legally said” that I would have to sell her the vacuum for $3.48.

This bit I do actually find believable. Anyone who has ever worked in retail has at least a few stories like this. But again, pain in the ass customers come from all walks of life and are just a part of the job. It has nothing to do with how someone pays for their groceries.

After contacting my manager, who went off to find the proper vacuum price, Welfare Queen #1 remarked that it must be tough to stand on a mat all day and be a cashier. I looked at her, smiled, shrugged, and said, “Well, it’s a job.” She was speechless.

Speechless, probably because it's a crappy job, that if you weren't still living at home with Mommy and Daddy, you would have to be on welfare too. While this "welfare queen" was probably feeling bad for the young girl, and maybe even a little guilty for being a difficult customer, the cashier was passing judgement on someone she knows nothing about.

After they finally admitted defeat, (not before Welfare Queen #2 realizing she didn’t have enough money to buy all of the food she had picked out, resulting in the waste of about $200 worth of products) the two women left about an hour and a half after they arrived at my register. The next man in line said that the two women reminded him of buying steel drums and cement. I said I was reminded why I vote Republican.

An hour and a half huh? That has to be a new record for slowest cashier in a Wal-Mart ever. She's not doing much to make Republicans look good here.

I am wondering how $200 worth of products were wasted too. Unless it was $200 worth of deli meat, you take the cart and go put the stuff back on the shelf. Again, pretty common task in retail and in particular working in a supermarket, reverse-shopping.

Maine has a problem with welfare spending. Maine has some of the highest rates in the nation for food stamp enrollment, Medicaid, and TANF. Nearly 30% of the state is on some form of welfare. Maine is the only state in the nation to rank in the top two for all three categories. This is peculiar, as Maine’s poverty rate isn’t even close to being the highest in the nation. The system in Maine is far easier to get into than in other states, and it encourages dependency. When a person makes over the limit for benefits, they lose all benefits completely. There is no time limit and no motivation to actually get back to work. Furthermore, spending on welfare has increased dramatically, but there has been no reduction of the poverty rate. Something is going terribly wrong, and the things I saw at work were indicators of a much larger problem. Something must change before the state runs out of money funding welfare programs.

I don't live in Maine and have never made a study of Maine's welfare system, so I cannot speak with authority on those details. However, we have already established that there is indeed a time limit for welfare benefits, and what she states there is plainly false.

She does make a statement here that does not seem to fit with the tone of the rest of her article, when she mentions that a person loses all benefits if they earn just a little too much. This is true, and is a factor in why a person might not take a few extra hours when offered, or otherwise partake of small opportunities that will jeopardize their lifeline. Is she suggesting though, that earning caps should be raised, so that people on welfare can stay on welfare even if they earn a little too much?

Finally, I do agree that increased welfare spending and no reduction in poverty are of very serious concern. But those problems will not be solved by attacking the intelligence of some lady at the grocery store who is trying to feed her kids with precious few resources. These problems are not a matter of personal choice, but the result of bad government policy overall, not only as they pertain to the welfare system. You aren't going to get rid of welfare by attacking the people who are on welfare. The only way to get rid of welfare is to give them job, real jobs, where they can earn an honest living. With 30 million people looking for work, and many millions more earning far less than what is needed to survive, welfare is absolutely necessary, unfortunately. Attacking the victims of flawed economic policy is nothing but a distraction from the real problems, and the real culprits. It is propaganda designed for the government and the corporations to scape-goat their own responsibility, to shift the blame. Meanwhile, the reality is that someone needs to earn more than double minimum wage, twice the rate of poverty, simply to get by. It's not a matter of personal choices, work ethic, or social graces. It's simple arithmetic.

Here is a sample budget, from a friend who lives in upstate NY. Feel free to comment if you believe it's unreasonable.

$1000 rent (trailer)
$100 electric
$50 cooking gas/hot water heater
$100 heating oil (monthly fee for lock-in price)
$300 groceries (including household goods such as soap, trash bags)
$50 clothing (laundry, underwear replacement when necessary, shoes)
$50 cellphone (basic prepaid service)
$100 triple-play (home phone, basic cable, internet)
$130 auto loan payment ($4k/36 mos/12.5%)
$120 auto insurance (under 35 with no tickets)
$150 gasoline (local only)
$50 auto maintenance (minimum)
$250 medical

$2450

That's over $15 an hour, TAKE HOME pay, just to survive. More than double minimum wage, BEFORE TAXES.

Pictorial - Myth vs. Reality of Living on Welfare

"People on welfare are lazy." 

Employment has been a requirement for welfare assistance since 1996. Sadly, there are simply not enough jobs to go around, while hundreds of thousands of low-wage workers lucky enough to have jobs are still forced to get foodstamps and other assistance.

"Everyone on welfare has a flat-screen TV, I can't even afford one."

The reality is that most people who are poor, or who are on welfare, cannot even afford television service so they would have no need of a television set at all.

"I always see people on food stamps taking their groceries of the store and loading them in a Cadillac."

Appearances are not always what they seem. Just because someone gets into a nice car doesn't mean it's their car at all, or that they didn't just lose their job and the repo man will be the next person you see behind the wheel. Sadly too, people tend to exaggerate to get their point across when voicing their anger about public assistance programs.

"If they were really poor, they couldn't afford nice clothes."

Just because a person is not a slob and tries to take care of their things, doesn't mean that they are not poor. In fact, keeping up appearances is instrumental when trying to pull oneself back out of poverty, after losing a job or otherwise hitting hard times financially.

"How are you online? If you were actually poor you couldn't afford a computer."

Modern technology is often taken for granted on the one hand, but then at the same time looked upon as something privileged, that only people of some financial means should have access to. In the modern world however, it would be next to impossible to get a job, make crucial appointments such as court appearances or doctor's visits, or otherwise operate in society at all without things like cell phones and computers.

"If you can afford cigarettes, you don't need welfare."

Living in poverty is a state of constant high-level stress, combined with long, tedious hours of forced idleness and despair. Cigarettes are not only an addictive habit, but also come to represent normalcy and freedom to someone who no longer has any control over their own lives. You might be surprised what someone would stoop to in order to taste the freedom of lighting up.

"How is it that poor people can afford to go out and get tattoos, but they can't afford to pay for a doctor?"

If you can find a doctor that will treat a bad case of Lyme disease for two packs of Newports and a bootleg DVD of Sons of Anarchy, you let us know down there in the comments section. In the meantime, poor folks will continue to get what they pay for.

You Probably Won't Believe What Americans Are Doing to Survive

I've seen this video in a few places, but I like the introduction given by the following article linked here...

Many Of You Will Not Believe Some Of The Things Americans Are Doing Just To Survive

You might not want to read this article if you have a weak stomach. Most Americans have absolutely no idea what is going on in the dark corners of America, and when people find out the truth it can come as quite a shock. Many of you will not believe some of the things Americans are doing just to survive. Some families are living in sewers and drain tunnels, some families are living in tents, some families are living in their cars, some families will make ketchup soup for dinner tonight and some families are even eating rats. Some homeless shelters in America are so overloaded that they are actually sending people out to live in the woods. As you read this, there are close to 50 million Americans that are living below the poverty line, and that number rises a little bit more every single day. America was once known as the greatest nation on earth, but now there is decay and economic despair almost everywhere you look. Yes, money certainly cannot buy happiness, but the lack of it sure can bring a lot of pain. As the economy continues to decline, the suffering that we see all around us is going to get a lot worse, and that is a very frightening thing to think about.

The following is a half hour documentary produced by the BBC entitled "Poor America". Trust me, this is a must watch. Your heart will break as you hear some American children talk about what they have to do for food....

POOR AMERICA

With one and a half million (1.5 million) American children now homeless, reporter Hilary Andersson meets the school pupils who go hungry in the richest country on Earth. From those living in the storm drains under Las Vegas to the tent cities now springing up around the United States, P a n o r a m a finds out how the poor are surviving in America and asks whatever happened to the supposed 'government' and the Real People in charge - those who you 'don't see' pulling on the strings; and their vision and welfare for the country.

Could this be a form of 'Social cleansing' without the need of war or disease inflicted by the orchestrators - simply a controlled bout of poverty? Or is this the forced education that only condition children to know only a certain amount of knowledge that can only ever see them progress in working environments such as confined offices within the 'Human Zoo' qualities within the desperately overcrowded cities.

Why are our children not educated properly - to be able to survive communally with real craft and building skills? Is the social mobility (as in other 'rich countries' such as the UK) only fairing the rich; the wealthy and the 'clever elite'; the white collar criminal, as per usual?

Broadcast Date: 13th February 2012

50 Economic Stats That Are Hard to Swallow

50 Economic Numbers From 2011 That Are Almost Too Crazy To Believe

#1 A staggering 48 percent of all Americans are either considered to be "low income" or are living in poverty.

#2 Approximately 57 percent of all children in the United States are living in homes that are either considered to be "low income" or impoverished.

#3 If the number of Americans that "wanted jobs" was the same today as it was back in 2007, the "official" unemployment rate put out by the U.S. government would be up to 11 percent.

#4 The average amount of time that a worker stays unemployed in the United States is now over 40 weeks.

#5 One recent survey found that 77 percent of all U.S. small businesses do not plan to hire any more workers.

#6 There are fewer payroll jobs in the United States today than there were back in 2000 even though we have added 30 million extra people to the population since then.

#7 Since December 2007, median household income in the United States has declined by a total of 6.8% once you account for inflation.

#8 According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 16.6 million Americans were self-employed back in December 2006.  Today, that number has shrunk to 14.5 million.

#9 A Gallup poll from earlier this year found that approximately one out of every five Americans that do have a job consider themselves to be underemployed.

#10 According to author Paul Osterman, about 20 percent of all U.S. adults are currently working jobs that pay poverty-level wages.

#11 Back in 1980, less than 30% of all jobs in the United States were low income jobs.  Today, more than 40% of all jobs in the United States are low income jobs.

#12 Back in 1969, 95 percent of all men between the ages of 25 and 54 had a job.  In July, only 81.2 percent of men in that age group had a job.

#13 One recent survey found that one out of every three Americans would not be able to make a mortgage or rent payment next month if they suddenly lost their current job.

#14 The Federal Reserve recently announced that the total net worth of U.S. households declined by 4.1 percent in the 3rd quarter of 2011 alone.

#15 According to a recent study conducted by the BlackRock Investment Institute, the ratio of household debt to personal income in the United States is now 154 percent.

#16 As the economy has slowed down, so has the number of marriages.  According to a Pew Research Center analysis, only 51 percent of all Americans that are at least 18 years old are currently married.  Back in 1960, 72 percent of all U.S. adults were married.

#17 The U.S. Postal Service has lost more than 5 billion dollars over the past year.

#18 In Stockton, California home prices have declined 64 percent from where they were at when the housing market peaked.

#19 Nevada has had the highest foreclosure rate in the nation for 59 months in a row.

#20 If you can believe it, the median price of a home in Detroit is now just $6000.

#21 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 18 percent of all homes in the state of Florida are sitting vacant.  That figure is 63 percent larger than it was just ten years ago.

#22 New home construction in the United States is on pace to set a brand new all-time record low in 2011.

#23 As I have written about previously, 19 percent of all American men between the ages of 25 and 34 are now living with their parents.

#24 Electricity bills in the United States have risen faster than the overall rate of inflation for five years in a row.

#25 According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, health care costs accounted for just 9.5% of all personal consumption back in 1980.  Today they account for approximately 16.3%.

#26 One study found that approximately 41 percent of all working age Americans either have medical bill problems or are currently paying off medical debt.

#27 If you can believe it, one out of every seven Americans has at least 10 credit cards.

#28 The United States spends about 4 dollars on goods and services from China for every one dollar that China spends on goods and services from the United States.

#29 It is being projected that the U.S. trade deficit for 2011 will be 558.2 billion dollars.

#30 The retirement crisis in the United States just continues to get worse.  According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, 46 percent of all American workers have less than $10,000 saved for retirement, and 29 percent of all American workers have less than $1,000 saved for retirement.

#31 Today, one out of every six elderly Americans lives below the federal poverty line.

#32 According to a study that was just released, CEO pay at America's biggest companies rose by 36.5% in just one recent 12 month period.

#33 Today, the "too big to fail" banks are larger than ever.  The total assets of the six largest U.S. banks increased by 39 percent between September 30, 2006 and September 30, 2011.

#34 The six heirs of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton have a net worth that is roughly equal to the bottom 30 percent of all Americans combined.

#35 According to an analysis of Census Bureau data done by the Pew Research Center, the median net worth for households led by someone 65 years of age or older is 47 times greater than the median net worth for households led by someone under the age of 35.

#36 If you can believe it, 37 percent of all U.S. households that are led by someone under the age of 35 have a net worth of zero or less than zero.

#37 A higher percentage of Americans is living in extreme poverty (6.7%) than has ever been measured before.

#38 Child homelessness in the United States is now 33 percent higher than it was back in 2007.

#39 Since 2007, the number of children living in poverty in the state of California has increased by 30 percent.

#40 Sadly, child poverty is absolutely exploding all over America.  According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, 36.4% of all children that live in Philadelphia are living in poverty, 40.1% of all children that live in Atlanta are living in poverty, 52.6% of all children that live in Cleveland are living in poverty and 53.6% of all children that live in Detroit are living in poverty.

#41 Today, one out of every seven Americans is on food stamps and one out of every four American children is on food stamps.

#42 In 1980, government transfer payments accounted for just 11.7% of all income.  Today, government transfer payments account for more than 18 percent of all income.

#43 A staggering 48.5% of all Americans live in a household that receives some form of government benefits.  Back in 1983, that number was below 30 percent.

#44 Right now, spending by the federal government accounts for about 24 percent of GDP.  Back in 2001, it accounted for just 18 percent.

#45 For fiscal year 2011, the U.S. federal government had a budget deficit of nearly 1.3 trillion dollars.  That was the third year in a row that our budget deficit has topped one trillion dollars.

#46 If Bill Gates gave every single penny of his fortune to the U.S. government, it would only cover the U.S. budget deficit for about 15 days.

#47 Amazingly, the U.S. government has now accumulated a total debt of 15 trillion dollars.  When Barack Obama first took office the national debt was just 10.6 trillion dollars.

#48 If the federal government began right at this moment to repay the U.S. national debt at a rate of one dollar per second, it would take over 440,000 years to pay off the national debt.

#49 The U.S. national debt has been increasing by an average of more than 4 billion dollars per day since the beginning of the Obama administration.

#50 During the Obama administration, the U.S. government has accumulated more debt than it did from the time that George Washington took office to the time that Bill Clinton took office.

60 Minutes Presents - Hard Times Generation: Families living in cars

One in Three Americans Face Poverty, Latest Census Study Shows

They drive cars, but seldom new ones. They earn paychecks, but not big ones. Many own homes. Most pay taxes. Half are married, and nearly half live in the suburbs. None are poor, but many describe themselves as barely scraping by.

Down but not quite out, these Americans form a diverse group sometimes called “near poor” and sometimes simply overlooked — and a new count suggests they are far more numerous than previously understood.

When the Census Bureau this month released a new measure of poverty, meant to better count disposable income, it began altering the portrait of national need. Perhaps the most startling differences between the old measure and the new involves data the government has not yet published, showing 51 million people with incomes less than 50 percent above the poverty line. That number of Americans is 76 percent higher than the official account, published in September. All told, that places 100 million people — one in three Americans — either in poverty or in the fretful zone just above it.

After a lost decade of flat wages and the worst downturn since the Great Depression, the findings can be thought of as putting numbers to the bleak national mood — quantifying the expressions of unease erupting in protests and political swings. They convey levels of economic stress sharply felt but until now hard to measure.

Read the full article at this link:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/19/us/census-measures-those-not-quite-in-poverty-but-struggling.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

19 Stats About Poverty That Will Astound You

#1 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of "very poor" rose in 300 out of the 360 largest metropolitan areas during 2010.

#2 Last year, 2.6 million more Americans descended into poverty.  That was the largest increase that we have seen since the U.S. government began keeping statistics on this back in 1959.

#3 It isn't just the ranks of the "very poor" that are rising.  The number of those just considered to be "poor" is rapidly increasing as well.  Back in the year 2000, 11.3% of all Americans were living in poverty.  Today, 15.1% of all Americans are living in poverty.

#4 The poverty rate for children living in the United States increased to 22% in 2010.

#5 There are 314 counties in the United States where at least 30% of the children are facing food insecurity.

#6 In Washington D.C., the "child food insecurity rate" is 32.3%.

#7 More than 20 million U.S. children rely on school meal programs to keep from going hungry.

#8 One out of every six elderly Americans now lives below the federal poverty line.

#9 Today, there are over 45 million Americans on food stamps.

#10 According to the Wall Street Journal, nearly 15 percent of all Americans are now on food stamps.

#11 In 2010, 42 percent of all single mothers in the United States were on food stamps.

#12 The number of Americans on food stamps has increased 74% since 2007.

#13 We are told that the economy is recovering, but the number of Americans on food stamps has grown by another 8 percent over the past year.

#14 Right now, one out of every four American children is on food stamps.

#15 It is being projected that approximately 50 percent of all U.S. children will be on food stamps at some point in their lives before they reach the age of 18.

#16 More than 50 million Americans are now on Medicaid.  Back in 1965, only one out of every 50 Americans was on Medicaid.  Today, approximately one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid.

#17 One out of every six Americans is now enrolled in at least one government anti-poverty program.

#18 The number of Americans that are going to food pantries and soup kitchens has increased by 46% since 2006.

#19 It is estimated that up to half a million children may currently be homeless in the United States.

Read the full article with more information at the following link:

http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/extreme-poverty-is-now-at-record-levels-19-statistics-about-the-poor-that-will-absolutely-astound-you

Single Dad Forced to Abandon 11-Year Old as Banks Foreclose

Eleven-year-old Sebastian Cross woke up July 18 to find his dad gone.

Left behind were two notes.

In the first, his father, Steven Alexander Cross, said there were no jobs for architects in the current economy. It went on to say their Lakeville home was in foreclosure and they would be evicted the following week.

Cross instructed Sebastian in the note to take his PlayStation and go to a neighbor's house.

The second note asks the neighbors to take care of his son.

"If this paper is wet, it's because I am crying so bad," the father wrote to the boy. "You know your dad loves you more than anything."

Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for Cross, 60, who was charged this month with a gross misdemeanor of child neglect, according to a Dakota County criminal complaint.

Sebastian is in the custody of Dakota County Child Protection, said County Attorney James Backstrom. He is living with a foster family but soon will be placed permanently with a relative.

"For a parent to abandon a child under these circumstances - it is both unusual and disturbing," Backstrom said.

Cross' last known whereabouts were in California, but officials have been unable to locate him.

On Thursday, his two-story home was vacant. Foreclosure signs on the front door said the house is under new ownership and told where to go to collect any items left behind. A bank bought the home Jan. 25 for $336,925, according to county records.

Read more: http://www.twincities.com/news/ci_18760371?source=rss

Unusual and disturbing there eh Mr. Lawyer who apparently has a fuckin' job. Better get used to this trend folks. And here they are going to charge this man with a crime, as if he wanted to lose his house and his son. This country makes me fekkin sick.

Oompa Loompa's Revolt!

Hershey/Palmyra, PA - Hundreds of foreign student-workers walked off the job and marched on downtown Hershey, Pennsylvania protesting low wages and poor working conditions at a packing warehouse for the candy giant Hershey Company. Protests were also planned for Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. The student guest-workers are here as part of a State Department program that brings hundreds of thousands of foreigners stateside each year to learn about American life.

Well, it appears the program is successful.

Using a special J-1 work-travel visa the students came to America and were contracted to the Palmyra plant by a California-based company called the Council for Educational Travel, USA (CETUSA). According to one article, the students...

...were made to do heavy lifting and meet a strenuous production schedule, some of them working night shift. They were paid only $8.35 an hour, and large portions of their paychecks were automatically deducted for program fees and rent. Students said after the deductions they were not earning enough to recoup the cost of the program and to make ends meet.

Welcome to America kids.

Now I would be the first to agree that wages in America have become absurdly unfair. Even at a dollar or so per hour above minimum wage, Americans lucky enough to have a full-time job will not earn enough to live on in most parts of the country. That is indeed a serious problem, for Americans. But for temporary foreign student-workers to be complaining about it seems absurd when Americans themselves aren't able to make ends meet. Shouldn't we be the ones protesting? Aren't these students lucky to even be paid anything at all when so many Americans are usually not paid anything for what amounts to an internship? Aren't the Oompa-Loompa's lucky to be out of Loompaland?

The New York Times article on this story gives this account of one student who participated in the program...

Harika Duygu Ozer, 19, a second-year medical student from a university in Istanbul, said she had heard from friends that the summer exchange program would be fun and that she would earn enough money to pay for her medical school tuition.

“I said, ‘Why not?’ This is America,” Ms. Ozer said. (emphasized)

When she was offered a contract for a job at a plant with Hershey’s chocolates, she said, she was excited. “We have all seen Charlie’s chocolate factory,” she said. “We thought, ‘This is good.’ ”

Like many other students, Ms. Ozer said she invested about $3,500, which included the program costs, to obtain the J-1 visa and travel to the United States.

Why would a they assume that they would be paid enough to not only pay for their entire trip and all of their living expenses, but also to pay for their future education? It seems that some of these students thought they hit the jackpot with a free ride in the land of milk and honey and were bound for streets of gold, but didn't have to bother reading a contract or to work out some basic arithmetic. It also seems that people around the world have a serious misconception of what life is really like in America. What exactly did they think they were being promised, a six-figure salary, free English classes, and a chauffeur to take them from theme park to theme park?

At $8.35 an hour, a student would have to work about 35 hours per week (before deductions) for 12 weeks (a summer vacation) in order to repay the $3,500 amount that Ms. Ozer invested. Seems like a quite generous offer really, to be promised paid employment in order to help offset the costs of their visit, at a time when tens of millions of willing and able Americans aren't able to find any regular work at all. Even after a deduction for $400 per month rent, far less than what many Americans pay for rent, she complains about being paid a bit less then $200 a week in "take home" pay. Again, welcome to America. There are many folks who are glad to take home even $50 a week after rent. And it seems that if she is actually netting that much pay, she is not forced to pay the deductions that American workers must pay. Working 40 hours a week, an American worker making $8.35 an hour will only take home about $230 or so per week, at most, BEFORE rent.

“We want to own our rights,” 20-year-old Chinese student Zhao Huijiao told the New York Times. “There is no cultural exchange, none, none… It is just work, work faster, work.” She and three other Chinese students held out their arms to display bruises from moving heavy boxes.

Bruises? Oh nose! Try working for a dollar less per hour in some gas station kwiki-mart dealing with asshole customers all day and running a very high risk of getting shot over the $200 in your cash register. Rights? What rights? You are not entitled to anything here in America, as a foreigner, yet you are enjoying as much rights as any American, and even more. You were guaranteed a job. A luxury most Americans do NOT have. Cultural exchange? Well buddy, take a big whiff of life in America. Work, go home, eat some ramen, watch some American Idol, sleep for a few hours, and do it all over again. That is life in America today. If you want more than that, then on your day off go ahead and visit a museum, or head on down do the Hershey fun park, have a candy bar and a slice of pizza. There is your cultural exchange. Granted, factory work is not the most fulfilling work. It is labor intensive and repetitive, but one could do a lot worse than to work in an American factory that has a rather high safety standard and labor protection laws compared to the rest of the world. Did you really think you were being promised an executive suite in Manhattan?

Here is another excerpt from the NYT article...

“You stand for the entire eight hours,” she said. “It is the worst thing for your fingers and hands and your back; you are standing at an angle.”

At one of the sites where she worked, she said, cameras were trained on her, and supervisors told her that if she did not want to maintain the pace of work, she should leave.

Well sweetheart, if you can't do the job, then why should they pay you? They need a job done, that is the bottom line. If you can't do it, you're on your own. They have no obligation to you of any sort. Take it up with the Sate Department if you don't like the job you were handed on a silver platter. In the meantime, they need these boxes packed and shipped. That's the job. Don't like it? Start putting out job applications elsewhere just like every other American and a long line of foreigners. And cameras? Lol. If you have a problem with cameras America is not the country for you.

One more excerpt form the NYT article quoting a student-worker...

Godwin Efobi, 26, a third-year medical student from Nigeria who is studying at a university in Ukraine, said his job was moving boxes. “Since I came here, I have a permanent ache in my back,” Mr. Efobi said. “Holding a pen is now a big task for me; my muscles ache.”

Wow, just wow. And folks have the nerve to call Americans soft? This guy lifts some boxes for a few hours and can't lift a pen? Hit the gym buddy.

Now all things considered here, I never read any of the contracts or promotional material recruiting these students. It's quite possible that they were coerced to some extent. I would not doubt that in the least in fact, that they were led to believe that they were being offered something more than they were getting, without actually being lied to "technically" for the benefit of an American company or two. But hey, that's lesson number one in America. Read the fine print. And if it isn't in the print at all, you damn well better ask and nail someone down to an answer before you commit. Never assume anything.

It also sounds too though, like all these medical students and so forth from foreign lands have a certain "silver spoon" syndrome that many American students also have. That somehow manual labor is beneath them. Or that working a full time job interferes with "more important" things.

So really, at the end of this article I am of mixed feelings. On the one hand, these students should feel lucky at all to be given any full-time job at all, even one above minimum wage on top of that, in order to offset their costs of living in America for a time under genuinely American conditions. On the other hand, we can see clearly that American corporations are exploiting foreign labor while shunning domestic labor. At the same time we must ask ourselves, how far have we fallen that people from third-world nations and totalitarian states find common life in America to be wretched?

End all be all, I think that these students were shocked to find that America is not what we have been billed to be around the world for so many years. We are rapidly degenerating into a third world nation, as predicted now for many years, and this story makes the prediction now apparently true. There is a very wide income disparity, workers are treated more unfairly than ever in relation to their pay versus labor. It is no exaggeration to say that we are being paid a slave-wage, or worse. At least slaves are given enough to subsist on. Today, so many American workers labor away only to find themselves sinking deeper and deeper into debt, as if there were a vampire draining away their life's toil, reducing them to less than slaves. Human beings of negative value.

A sad state of affairs. Did we really need some foreign students to wake us up to this new American reality?

Sourced and related articles:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/18/us/18immig.html?pagewanted=all

http://wsws.org/articles/2011/aug2011/hers-a22.shtml

http://rt.com/usa/news/students-protest-exchange-hersheys/

Why is abortion illegal for men but not women?

Poverty often plays a major role in crimes of all sorts, but so very often in domestic violence crimes. It also plays a deadly serious role in reproduction and family planning issues.

Now before we get off on the wrong foot here, I want to say that clearly the man who is the subject of the news article below was wrong in his actions. You can't go violently attacking people in a civilized society. But having said that, I can empathize with the man, and would like to examine the deeper socio-economic issues behind this news brief...

Man charged with trying to abort his pregnant girlfriend

LIBERTY – A 20-year-old Liberty man has been charged with felony abortion in the second degree and other charges for allegedly punching his 17-year-old pregnant girlfriend in the stomach in an effort to abort the pregnancy.


Travis Mervine was also charged with third-degree assault, fourth-degree criminal mischief, second-degree unlawful imprisonment, criminal obstruction of breathing or blood circulation, and harassment in the second degree.


The girlfriend called police on May 22 from her mother’s house to report she had been held prisoner by Mervine at his home from May 21 through May 22 and while there, he punched her in the stomach.


Mervine was located and arrested on Lake Street in the Village of Liberty and while police were taking him to court for arraignment, he fled from an officer on foot, while handcuffed.


After a four hour manhunt, Liberty Police, assisted by a Fallsburg Police K-9 unit, State Police and the Sullivan County Sheriff’s Office, he was located at his father’s home in Liberty. He was also charged with felony escape in the second degree.


Mervine was arraigned and remanded to the Sullivan County Jail without bail.

http://www.midhudsonnews.com/News/2011/May/24/Mervine_arr-24May11.htm

Right off the bat I have a problem with this article. I don't know if it is just an error in reporting or not, but why is he being charged with felony abortion if it was only an attempt? We'll leave that technical question alone from here on out though, and focus instead on the deeper issues here.

Clearly we see a young man, trapped by circumstance, desperately thrashing about in vain to keep his freedom. Not only freedom from incarceration after his violent outburst, but to maintain his freedom of choice and his own economic freedom. To that extent, I certainly can empathize with him even if I don't condone his actions. This system of hypocrisy breeds this sort of violence and rebellion.

If a woman wants to terminate a pregnancy, there is nothing the father can do about it. He can not insist that the child be born, cannot sue the woman if she chooses to kill the unborn against his wishes. She does not even have to tell him that she is pregnant or going for an abortion in the first place.

Yet when it serves the purposes of women, children suddenly becomes a "mutual" choice and responsibility. If the man decides he does not want to be father, or simply can't be a father under his current circumstances for any reason, he's shit out of luck. Not only does he have no say in whether or not that child is brought into the world, but then he is also forced to pay for it against his will, quite often literally beyond his financial means to do so even if he wanted to. Other men simply may not want to fill the role of a father, which every child certainly should have. Single parent homes are far from ideal despite what we as a society have been brainwashed to believe. If a man does not want to be a father, then he should not be forced to be. When you do force him, you wind up with situations like this one reported above, maybe worse. Or, more commonly, men who begrudgingly and halfheartedly try to meet "their responsibility" as women and the government become loathed, and even his own children become objects of pain and hatred rather than love and pride.

Of course, there is the tired old excuse that the man should wear a condom if he does not want to be a father. Sorry folks, that shit don't fly with me. Women have far more choices when it comes to birth control, up to and including termination of a pregnancy (or simply insisting that the man wear a condom in the first place.) With rights comes responsibility. Why should the man be responsible for the WOMAN'S CHOICE? It is not a shared responsibility, it is not a mutual decision, it is the woman's choice, plain and simple, as this news article makes abundantly clear. The woman is responsible for her own body, and the man has NO RIGHTS over whether or not "his" child is brought into the world.

Can I sue a woman who transmits some disease to me, knowing that she had a disease, because I chose to not wear a condom? Certainly not. And the same should go the opposite way. A woman should not be able to sue a man financially, for the consequences of the transmission of biological material, which she knew full well the potential consequences of. She could have gone on the pill, patch, shot, used the ring, foam, sponge, spermicide, diaphragm, implant, or female condom, insisted that the man wear a condom or simply elected to not have sex with a man who had no intention of being a father to a child. (Here's a hint ladies, if he didn't put a ring on it, he doesn't wanna be your baby-daddy.) A woman can also choose to abstain when she is most fertile and ovulating, and obviously much more likely to become pregnant. Short of that, the woman can still resort to the morning-after pill, and ultimately it is her choice, the woman's choice alone, whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term.

So long as it is "her body, her choice" then it is also her responsibility. She should have no right whatsoever to insist that a man participate in any way, financially or otherwise, with the rearing of that offspring that was the product of her choice, and her choice alone. Unless of course, we want to make it a truly mutual responsibility, and outlaw abortion without the consent of the father as well. With freedom comes responsibility.

SUPPLEMENTAL:

Technically, in some instances a woman can also be guilty of illegal abortion under NY Penal Code. But basically, those amount to abortions that are done outside of a clinical setting under the care of a sanctioned physician. You will also notice too though, the gender bias applied to such cases. Keep in mind here too, that these laws make no distinction as to the willingness of the female to participate in an abortional act perpetrated by a man. In other words, even if the woman does not want the baby, but the man commits the abortional act on her behalf, he is STILL guilty of a felony.

S 125.40 Abortion in the second degree.
A person is guilty of abortion in the second degree when he commits an
abortional act upon a female, unless such abortional act is justifiable
pursuant to subdivision three of section 125.05.
Abortion in the second degree is a class E felony.


S 125.45 Abortion in the first degree.
A person is guilty of abortion in the first degree when he commits
upon a female pregnant for more than twenty-four weeks an abortional act
which causes the miscarriage of such female, unless such abortional act
is justifiable pursuant to subdivision three of section 125.05.
Abortion in the first degree is a class D felony.


S 125.50 Self-abortion in the second degree.
A female is guilty of self-abortion in the second degree when, being
pregnant, she commits or submits to an abortional act upon herself,
unless such abortional act is justifiable pursuant to subdivision three
of section 125.05.
Self-abortion in the second degree is a class B misdemeanor.


S 125.55 Self-abortion in the first degree.
A female is guilty of self-abortion in the first degree when, being
pregnant for more than twenty-four weeks, she commits or submits to an
abortional act upon herself which causes her miscarriage, unless such
abortional act is justifiable pursuant to subdivision three of section
125.05.
Self-abortion in the first degree is a class A misdemeanor.